My Animal Crossing Journey: From Wild World to New Horizons!

If you haven’t guessed already, I quite like Animal Crossing. A game where you are the only human in a world of animal villagers. You go about your day doing tasks for said animal villagers and have to earn bells (money) to pay off your crippling debt to a guy called Tom Nook. It’s only the best game ever.

I thought, to celebrate the VERY anticipated and exciting release of Animal Crossing New Horizons, I would write about my Animal Crossing journey. How is a game that I first played as a child, back in 2007, having such a large impact on my life in 2020? I’ve already told you the short answer to this. (it is the best game ever) But, if you’ve got some time to take a trip down memory lane with me then lets start at the beginning of my Animal Crossing journey…

2007 – Animal Crossing Wild World

Animal Crossing Wild World was released on Nintendo DS in 2005. This wasn’t the first game in the Animal Crossing series, there was ‘The’ Animal Crossing released on Nintendo GameCube in 2001. But, at a prime age of 1, I surprisingly didn’t play it.

BUT, I have recently started streaming me playing through the GameCube version of Animal Crossing! You can go follow me on Twitch (My name is MSBLife) so you are notified when I go live. Which, as of March 20th, will be a LOT! In fact, I’m probably streaming as you are reading this...

Just before we start my Animal Crossing journey, let me set the scene. I got my first Nintendo DS in the summer of 2006. My brother and I were left some money from my Grandad so I got a pink one and he got a black.

A few of my Animal Crossing bits!

I’m not actually sure how I got Wild World and only remember all the hours I spent playing. I would say I was too young to properly understand parts of the game such as the turnip system but, damn, I still don’t now.

My brother and two cousins would be constantly playing this game, visiting each other’s villages, which did sometimes cause arguments. This was because if you spoke to a villager at someone else’s village then there would be a chance they would move to yours. This meant I had certain villagers on lock down.

2010 – Animal Crossing Let’s Go To The City

Once again, I was late to this game too. Animal Crossing ‘Let’s Go To The City’ came out on Nintendo Wii in 2008. I don’t remember exactly but I think it would have been around 2010 that I got it. BOY, was I excited. The Wii got moved into my bedroom and I was ready to hit the city!

Unfortunately, I also don’t have that many memories from this part of my Animal Crossing journey. To be honest, I didn’t take to using the Wii remote and Nunchuk to control. What I do remember is going away on a primary school trip for a week and coming back to find my brother had completely grinded the game. He had a HUGE house, thousands of bells and left me feeling poor.

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I think this game is less prominent in my Animal Crossing journey because of the competition. The Nintendo Wii had a lot of other really fun games that I spent hours playing, whereas, the other games on Nintendo DS couldn’t compare.

2012 – Animal Crossing New Leaf

This is where my Animal Crossing journey flourished. I got my first job in 2012 and saved up every penny I could to buy a Nintendo 3DS in time for the release of Animal Crossing New Leaf. In fact, I didn’t go on to buy barely any other game for 3DS as my sole purchasing purpose was to play that.

I spent SO many hours on New Leaf!

It is actually crazy looking back and thinking that I have owned New Leaf for the past 8 years and I still enjoy playing it today. That’s how you know it is a good game. Because of this, I have many memories. I remember being so proud that I had bought it myself and opening it every morning to do my daily tasks. In fact, those daily tasks became part of my routine. Despite going through phases of playing, I even did the routine whilst on holiday for two weeks back in October 2018.

Metacritic gave Animal Crossing New Leaf a rating of 88% which is really good. New Leaf brought a whole new aspect of playing to Animal Crossing, putting you in the Mayor’s seat as Tortimer retired to Tortimer Island. Being able to have more control over your town, such as choosing what goes where, was amazing.

If you are reading this on Friday 20th March then I am doing an all-day stream to celebrate the release of Animal Crossing New Horizons! Check out my schedule below and head over to Twitch to watch my first impressions now!

2015 – Animal Crossing Happy Home Designer

I’ll be honest, I don’t think I’ve played more than five hours of this game. Happy Home Designer would be a lower point of my Animal Crossing journey. I had thought, at their announcement, that were releasing another main game and I won’t lie that I was disappointed. However, I, of course, had to get it on release day anyway.

It did come with a NFC scanner and an amiibo card. (Unfortunately, that amiibo card was Kapp’n.) I think it is interesting how they are linking designs from this game into New Horizons so there may be points when I return back. Apart from that, I can only thank this game for introducing me to amiibos.

2020 – Animal Crossing New Horizons

And that brings my Animal Crossing journey to present day! We have been waiting 8 years for another main Animal Crossing game and I can’t quite believe it comes out tomorrow. I find myself going into release day surrounded my such lovely and supportive people who also LOVE the game and I can’t wait to get to play with everyone.

I don’t know every single detail about this series and I am in no way even that ‘good’ at it. But, I do completely adore this game with my whole heart and it brings me so much happiness.

If you are looking for some more Animal Crossing related content then I would LOVE for you to come over and watch me stream on Twitch! I’m also uploading highlight videos and a weekly countdown to release day vlog on my YouTube channel. And, of course, I am always tweeting about it over on my Twitter.

DJ KK is my favourite!

This is such an exciting time for me and everyone in the Animal Crossing community and I would love to share that with you! 🙂

Let me know down in the comments if you have played any of the Animal Crossing games or whether this might be the first you are hearing of them. Also, please, let me know if you are getting New Horizons as I would love to connect and play together!

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3 Comments

Chloe

Ahhhh I loved this, it’s so nice to see how AC has impacted people’s lives and has been around for a long time! I’m hoping to pop into the stream when I’m not busy playing it myself lol, I can’t believe it’s finally out tomorrow!!!